
Smart City team was invited to create a panel of high school students for Rice University's Black Houston Symposium to share their perspectives on DEI. The symposium was held on March 23rd - 24th at The African American History Research Center, Gregory Campus, and Rice University's Fondren Library.
The symposium was designed to provide a forum for community members and scholars to come together and discuss how the political, economic, and social landscapes of Houston impact Afro-Diasporic communities.
The team came up with the idea of organizing a hackathon to ask students to present solutions to the following prompt: Develop a financially sustainable model for supporting entrepreneurship ventures of young adults in Houston, specifically those launched by underrepresented groups.
56 students and 14 teams participated in the hackathon and it was judged by experts in the field of DEI along with the leadership of the Black Houston Symposium.
New Embracement




Jackeline Maya
Jessica Leyva
Gisselle Gonzalez
Donalia Barrett

Team 6 from North Houston Early College High School earned a special Excellence in Action award for already implementing elements of their team's winning solution in their local community.

Chelsea Obua
WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER
WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER
WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER
WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER WINNER
THIRD
THIRD
THIRD
THIRD
THIRD
THiRD
HAMCABA





Hadi Hafeez
Mihir Relan
Anderson Acord
Mohamed Mehaisi
Bianca Juarez
honorable mentions

Hadi Hafeez

Mihir Relan

Anderson Acord

Mohamed Mehaisi

Bianca Juarez





Anna Wang
Eva McKay
Kari Sparrock
Zhiling Zhang
Chelsea Obua
Team 5: https://youtu.be/q857CiQ8ueE





Mayowa Ogunbowale
Priya Jagarnauth
Daniel Ceballos
Kyra Brown
Jameson Ezzell

Sophia Roman

Laiya Whitaker

Nathan Kenmognie
Team 14: https://youtu.be/MhZLgptnIZg


Gautam Devashish
Sohan Nidamarthy

Rohan Nidamarthy

Sehaj Doshi
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Zayd Ahmad